I’m giving this a more positive rating than I think it strictly deserves because I played through the whole game twice so I can’t pretend like I wasn’t enjoying myself but it’s still a flawed game. This is my first Atelier game and I’m definitely hooked. I wasn’t sure I would like the deadlines but having played this one, I’m honestly a little disappointed that they’re not in every game. It gave the whole thing a structure that I missed when I played the overtime section. Overall, this game has a satisfying gameplay loop with the alchemy system and the assignments with a basic but decent story. The combat wasn’t that interesting however and the characters had cute designs but didn’t stand out in a huge way for me. My biggest issue was honestly just how many days you could lose exploring the different areas, which had the bad effect of making me not want to explore for fear of accidentally bumping up too close to a deadline just because I went into a side area with a couple of rocks in it. I do hope this gets changed a little in the next games, which I will be playing. I think I can easily call myself a fan now.